Oh no, it happened again & Crabs

Steven joined me in DC this past weekend to keep me company on my marathon work trip. Since DC was experiencing global warming in the form of torrential downpours, our nightly trips for dinner and a walk were usually cut short. One place that we liked, la tomate, we visited on 2 occasions. The first night we went there, in a rare occurrence, we ordered the same thing: lobster fettuccini. Now, I should have know from my previous experience that things can be quite literal, our meal came with....drum roll please...a lobster on top of the fettuccini. I could only laugh. Of course this happened to me. More than once.

In another culinary snafu, Steven ordered soft shelled crab from a seafood place. Why he did this, only he knows, but I do have to give him props for being adventurous with food. I would NEVER order something like that. Even if it is considered a delicacy. When the critters arrived I could tell that Steven was having second thoughts about his meal choice. The crabs looked exactly as I would imagine them in the wild. The waiter assured him that he should eat the entire critter, soft shell and all. Steven was a trooper and gave it his best, but after eating nearly one whole crab (there were 2 good sized ones), he confessed that he thought he might throw up.

That entire night Steven said that he felt like the crab was trying to get back out. It did eventually make its way out, but it landed in the toilet, with a splash.

What's up with Wellesley?

A bunch of us went to a wake last night in Wellesley. Afterwards we wanted to get a drink and catch up (it was friends from my last job). Wellesley is a dry town, except at hotels and restaurants. What gets me is that you can't buy a 6-pack at a liquor store, but you can drink one at a restaurant in Wellesley? Go figure.

We decided on Papa Razi and when we arrived the bar was empty - perfect! I noticed right away that there were no bar stools, but didn't really mind because we were all standing around chatting anyway. What really got me is that each time we ordered a drink (we leaned across the bar to give the bartender our drink order), the bartender would make our drink and then lean under the bar to give it to us. Not once did he pass our drinks across the bar. After this happened a few times we asked him why he was going through all of the trouble to give us our drinks on our side of the bar. He told us that Wellesley law states that he cannot pass drinks across the bar to patrons. To do that would constitute a real bar, and Wellesley prohibits those (and bar stools). How stupid is that? OK, let's all pretend that we're not standing at a bar, ordering drinks from the bartender. It's not really a bar because we're not sitting down and he isn't passing our drinks to us. PLEASE.

Nice job Wellesley. You keep on believing that you're a dry town. I won't tell anyone.